Skip Navigation



Nucleic Acids Research Advance Access published online on February 28, 2007
Nucleic Acids Research, doi:10.1093/nar/gkm050
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow Print PDF (3007K) Freely available
Right arrow Screen PDF (291K) Freely available
Right arrow Supplementary Material
Right arrowOA All Versions of this Article:
35/7/2116    most recent
gkm050v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrow Commercial Re-use Guidelines
for Open Access NAR Content
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Genest, P.-A.
Right arrow Articles by Borst, P.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Genest, P.-A.
Right arrow Articles by Borst, P.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© 2007 The Author(s)
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Molecular Biology

Telomeric localization of the modified DNA base J in the genome of the protozoan parasite Leishmania

Paul-André Genest, Bas ter Riet, Tony Cijsouw, Henri G.A.M. van Luenen and Piet Borst*

Division of Molecular Biology and Centre of Biomedical Genetics, The Netherlands Cancer Institute, Plesmanlaan 121, 1066 CX Amsterdam, The Netherlands

*To whom Correspondence should be addressed. Tel: +31 20 512 2880; Fax: +31 20 669 1383; Email: p.borst{at}nki.nl

Received October 11, 2006. Revised December 5, 2006. Accepted January 16, 2007.

Base J or ß-D-glucosylhydroxymethyluracil is a DNA modification replacing a fraction of thymine in the nuclear DNA of kinetoplastid parasites and of Euglena. J is located in the telomeric sequences of Trypanosoma brucei and in other simple repeat DNA sequences. In addition, J was found in the inactive variant surface glycoprotein (VSG) expression sites, but not in the active expression site of T. brucei, suggesting that J could play a role in transcription silencing in T. brucei. We have now looked at the distribution of J in the genomes of other kinetoplastid parasites. First, we analyzed the DNA sequences immunoprecipitated with a J-antiserum in Leishmania major Friedlin. Second, we investigated the co-migration of J- and telomeric repeat-containing DNA sequences of various kinetoplastids using J-immunoblots and Southern blots of fragmented DNA. We find only ~1% of J outside the telomeric repeat sequences of Leishmania sp. and Crithidia fasciculata, in contrast to the substantial fraction of non-telomeric J found in T. brucei, Trypanosoma equiperdum and Trypanoplasma borreli. Our results suggest that J is a telomeric base modification, recruited for other (unknown) functions in some kinetoplastids and Euglena.


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Nucleic Acids ResHome page
D. K. Ekanayake, M. J. Cipriano, and R. Sabatini
Telomeric co-localization of the modified base J and contingency genes in the protozoan parasite Trypanosoma cruzi
Nucleic Acids Res., October 8, 2007; 35(19): 6367 - 6377.
[Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]


Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.